2024-25 NBA The All-Star starters were announced Thursday, and they were predictable selections with Stephen Curry, LeBron James and Kevin Durant, the elders of the old guard, all getting the nod in the Western Conference.
The East was an easier decision, aside from the LaMelo Ball dilemma. The at-large voting group was right to reward Jalen Brunson and Donovan Mitchell with the starting jobs on defense, while leaving Ball, who earned the most fan votes among East point guards, to fight for a reserve spot . Here are the full starting lineups, determined by 50% of the fan votes and 25% each of the media and current players:
Before we continue, let’s remember that these “starting” designations serve no practical purpose given the change to this year’s All-Star Game format, which will divide the 24 All-Stars into three teams of eight (the winner of the Rising Game of stars (be the fourth team) for a bracket tournament or something.
This seems like a silly idea, but the NBA is desperate to generate any kind of competitive juice between players to at least make the All-Star Game watchable. We’ll see if it works. But that’s another story. What we’re talking about is naming these starters as a matter of recognizing the 10 players (with the exception of two guards and three in the frontcourt, of course) who are having the best seasons.
Through that lens, voters overlooked a couple of high-profile brands in naming Curry, James and Durant as starters over Anthony Edwards and Victor Wembanyama, who deserved the starting distinction. As noted, two guards must be appointed at each conference, which makes the first of these debates fairly easy:
Edwards should be in Curry’s place
Yes, I understand the game is in San Francisco, so we all understand the concept and, to some extent, the validity of a lifetime achievement award. It’s not like Curry isn’t having a good season, either. He is. He’s averaging 22 points per game on 40% three-point shooting with no other legitimate threat occupying the defense’s attention.
It qualifies as a borderline offense for the Warriors to lean so heavily on Curry at this stage of his career, all to be a Play-In team at best, instead of pulling the trigger on a trade to get him the help they certainly is still capable. to put it to good use.
However, Edwards is having a better season. For starters, Edwards is scoring significantly more (26.2 points per game vs. 22.6). Second, Edwards leads the league with 184 3-pointers entering Thursday’s game, with Curry more than 30 behind with 151; they’re virtually identical per game, and Edwards is actually doing them at a significantly higher rate (42.5% to 40.7%).
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This is not to mention the defensive gap between Curry and Edwards, who obviously has more weight in both directions. All the advanced metrics favor Curry, who, again, is having another great season even if the total stats don’t stand out. But Edwards is hampered by many of the same restrictions Curry faces with the Warriors, who actually have better spacing than the Wolves. Edwards has been forced to blitz from 3 along with Julius Randle, who doesn’t fit well and who defenses don’t respect from beyond the arc.
And yet, he is charging them (again) at a rate higher than curry. The Wolves have a better record than the Warriors, and Edwards has yet to miss a single game, having suited up nine more times than Curry as of Thursday. It all adds up to Edwards.
It was a tough climb for Edwards, who placed fifth in fan voting, to overtake Curry, who was second to Gilgeous-Alexander among West guards in fan voting, which makes up 50% of the equation. initial. That being said, the media and players also voted Curry over Edwards, and they were wrong.
Edwards was third in both, so they didn’t miss by much. But they still missed it. The fans are really at fault here, as they made the gap Edwards needed to clear too big, but he deserved the player and media vote as at least a nod to the fact that he’s having a better season than Curry.
Wemby was also snubbed
Nikola Jokic was a lock for one of the West’s three frontcourt spots, leaving four viable candidates for the final two spots: LeBron, Anthony Davis, Durant and Wembanyama. As noted, LeBron and Durant were the two selected. Both are having very good seasons, but not as good as Wembanyama, who has the Spurs 12 wins ahead of last year’s pace, the second-best jump in the league year-over-year behind Detroit.
LeBron, at 40, was one of only two players averaging at least 23 points, nine assists and seven rebounds entering the game on Thursday, the other being Jokic, so let’s not go too far in downplaying him.
The same goes for Durant, who is averaging over 27 points, six rebounds and four assists with typically elite efficiency. But the slight offensive advantage that Durant, or LeBron, has over Wembanyama is not significant enough to cover Wembanyama’s enormous defensive advantage.
On track to become the 10th player in history to block four shots per game, and just the fifth to do so while averaging at least 20 points and 10 rebounds, Wembanyama is the undisputed DPOY favorite, having already established himself as the best league player. Impactful defensive player by an appreciable margin.
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Also of note is that Wembanyama has played more games than Durant (a relatively paltry 35 to 33, but still) and is putting up similar numbers in nearly three fewer minutes per night. Every 36 minutes, Wembanyama is recording nearly identical points and assists to Durant while outrebounding him, and he’s also scoring and rebounding at a higher rate than LeBron.
So whose place should Wemby have been? I’d say Durant, only because Phoenix has been the most disappointing team among the three involved and because James is making his 20th straight All-Star start; There’s no need to break that streak when he’s still playing at such a high level. Plus, fans voted LeBron ahead of Durant, so Wemby had a better chance of overtaking Durant.
As for who is to blame for the Wemby snub, it was, first and foremost, the fans, who voted LeBron second and Durant third. That put Wembanyama behind the eight ball, and the players sealed their fate by voting LeBron and Durant to tie for second place, leaving Wemby in fourth place. The media voted Wembanyama second, which was the right decision, but not enough to achieve the right result.